The Siloam Springs School District's maintenance department is responsible for caring for nearly a million square feet of buildings and 166 acres of land spread out between the district's six campuses, school administration buildings, maintenance buildings and bus barn, according to Randall Bolinger, maintenance department manager.
Bolinger gave a report about the department at the Nov. 17 school board meeting. Jody Wiggins, assistant superintendent, explained that Bolinger recently presented the report to school administration and said he wanted the information to be presented to the school board as well.
The maintenance department has nine full-time maintenance workers and 12 full-time custodians. They handle an average of 260 to 300 work orders each month, including preventative maintenance orders, Bolinger reported. So far this year, they have completed 3,171 work orders with more than 140 works in progress for 2016, he said.
Thirty-eight percent of the work orders generated through the district's computer system are preventative maintenance, Bolinger said. A total of 71 percent of normal work orders are completed in less than seven days and 84 percent of maintenance work orders are completed in less than one month, he said.
The maintenance department is also responsible for unloading an average of 300 cases of commodities for the school lunch program each month, Bolinger said. Each week the team delivers an average of 50 to 60 cases of commodities to the six school kitchens throughout the district.
Board member Louie Thomas observed that the maintenance department did a good job of keeping the grass mowed on all of the school property over the summer despite an unusual amount of rain.
The department has done a wonderful job of making things look good on all campuses, said board member Brent Butler.
Wiggins said the district continually gets positive feedback on maintenance staff and said he has heard numerous comments on how clean and well kept the school's facilities are.
The December school board meeting has been rescheduled to Tuesday, Dec. 15 because the original date coincides with the Arkansas School Board Association conference. It will be held at 5:30 p.m. in the school board room at the Middle School.
Actions taken by the school board included the following:
• Approve a resolution to support the 2016 six-year master plan and 2017-2019 funding cycle partnership program. The master plan was presented during public hearing, held before the October school board meeting.
• Approved one student transfer request from the Siloam Springs School District to the Gentry School District.
• Approved 13 student transfers from the Gentry School District to the Siloam Springs School District.
General News on 11/25/2015